The year 2019 ended with overall financing needs of MAD 46.170 billion, which is MAD 4.869 billion more than a year before. (...) To cover this financing need, the Treasury has resorted to domestic financing (MAD 29.171 billion) and to external financing (MAD 16.999 billion," according to the Audit court which just released its report on the implementation of the State budget for 2019.

The Treasury's debt outstanding continued its upward trend with an increase of MAD 25.376 billion (+3.5%) compared to 2018, 53% of which is in the form of external debt.

As a result, the debt ratio stood at 65.4% of gross domestic product (GDP), virtually stable compared to the level reached in 2018, representing a 5.4-point gap from the government's objective of reaching a debt level of around 60%, announced as part of the government's 2017-2021 program, the report explained.

In 2019, the domestic debt was up 2.1% compared to 2018 (MAD 586.497 billion), or 78.4% of the debt outstanding, while the external debt reached MAD 161.499 billion against MAD 147.983 billion a year earlier (+9.1%).

"This evolution of the Treasury's external debt is due to a MAD 19.2 MMDH increase in drawings which reached MAD 25.447 billion in 2019 against MAD 6.247 billion a year before," explains the report.